


A Diffident Love

by ninetystars



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon Compliant, Character Study, Galaxy Garrison, Happy Ending, M/M, kind of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-10
Updated: 2020-10-10
Packaged: 2021-03-08 02:21:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,316
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26938093
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ninetystars/pseuds/ninetystars
Summary: He meets Keith Kogane at the age of eighteen. He never smiles, has no friends and has a talent for annoying both professors and students alike.He never apologises for it, either.Lance thinks he’s an asshole.
Relationships: Keith/Lance (Voltron)
Comments: 17
Kudos: 124





	A Diffident Love

He’s filled with love. A diffident love that makes his heart sing a tune of wonder. Lance McClain is thirteen years old when he has his first crush.

It makes him laugh a little too much, talk a little too loud, move a little too quickly. But when she talks, he makes sure to pause all movements to focus on her, like she’s the only light in the world. Because to him, she is.

Months pass and the feeling grows stronger. Stronger and stronger and stronger, until it’s consuming him. The tune of wonder vanishes, and instead his palms begin to sweat. His heart no longer sings a sweet melody, rather favouring the heavy beats of a bass drum that reverberates throughout his entire being. He wonders when this stopped being fun.

He decides to confess. So many emotions flit through him, all following a trail paved by his anxiety. He feels like he’s going to cry. He’s not sure why.

She looks at him, and he looks at her. He talks.

Her smile begins to fade from her face.

“I’m sorry, Lance.”

At the age of thirteen, Lance McClain experiences his first heart break.

***

He has his first kiss when he is fifteen years old. He’s inexperienced, and so is the boy he is kissing. His lip gets caught in Lance’s braces, and Lance does not meet his eye at school for the next week.

And yet, Lance can’t help the smile that brightens his face during the late hours of the night, when he lies back in his bed and thinks about the boy. He thinks about how it’d feel to kiss him again, properly this time. Thinks about the feel of his hand against his. The warmth of his body.

He twists in his bed and lies on his side as he hugs his pillow tight against his body. His cheeks hurt form all the smiling he’s been doing, but it’s a welcome ache.

***

It happens again.

This diffident love of his morphs into something strong, something terrifying. He’s sure the whole class can hear the beating in his chest, and it’s making it a little less easy to breathe.

They’re sitting besides one another, and Lance can barely focus on anything. It’s like they’re the only two people in the room.

But this isn’t like what he’s seen in the movies. It’s a suffocating feeling, and he becomes self conscious of everything he does. As if one wrong move will make the boy besides him lose any and all interest in him.

He’s learnt his lesson. He will not confess. He will not leech on. He will do the opposite.

He avoids.

He’ll walk a different direction, he’ll pretend he hasn’t seen him as they walk past one another, he’ll make sure his eyes never linger on him. He’s trying not to be overbearing.

In all his avoidance, Lance misses the looks of hurt from his crush.

By the end of the school year, they’re barely even friends anymore.

Lance hates himself for it.

***

Maybe love isn’t for him.

If he doesn’t know how to act like himself around any potential partner, then maybe love just isn’t for him.

***

He meets Keith Kogane at the age of eighteen. He never smiles, has no friends and has a talent for annoying both professors and students alike.

He never apologises for it, either.

Lance thinks he’s an asshole.

***

Keith is always alone. He never looks uncomfortable or awkward about it, though.

Lance feels an itch.

He ignores it.

***

“They all suck,” Lance hears from around the corner.

He’s not eavesdropping.

He was walking to his class, he swears it, but the distinct voice of Keith Kogane floats through the air, and it has him stopping in his tracks.

“You can’t say that,” Takashi Shirogane, one of their instructors, says.

“I can,” Keith continues, “they’re all boring. And all they do is talk shit to me.”

“Because you provoke them, Keith.”

A pause.

“Not my fault I’m better at flying than they are.”

That sentence brings a hidden rage that Lance didn’t know he was capable of feeling. It’s deep red in its anger, and he feels it thrum through his veins.

He storms away without casting them a second glance, digging his nails into the palm of his hand so hard that it leaves its crescent-like indents behind.

***

(“…there is one person, though.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

Keith bites his bottom lip.

He thinks of ocean blue).

***

“ _Better at flying_. Who even says that? How arrogant can you be?”

“To be fair, he _does_ have the best piloting record in the year,” Hunk says as he eats his lunch.

Lance scowls. “Only because I haven’t been trying.”

Hunk pauses his bite to give him a Look. “You haven’t been trying for six months?”

Lance doesn’t dignify that with a response, just shoves a forkful of pasta into his mouth.

In the corner of his eye, he spots Keith sitting alone under a tree. He has his headphones in and appears to be doing nothing. Just watching the sky above.

“ _Better at flying._ I’ll show him.”

***

He works hard. Way harder than he ever thought he would in his life, and it almost pays off.

He now sits comfortably in 2nd place for best piloting record.

He should be proud, and he is in a way, but he thought that climbing the ranks would feel more rewarding than…well. Than this.

Keith still watches the world outside a window when they’re in class, barely gives anyone the time of day.

He wonders why he cares so much. Why it hurts.

***

During their next piloting simulation, Lance makes sure to capture his attention. Makes sure to get noticed. He doesn’t question himself too much about his motives.

“Hope you’re ready to lose,” he says, head held high.

Keith looks at him wide eye for a moment. “Okay.”

Lance is a little taken aback by his retort.

Keith seems to be as well, if the red blossoming at the tips of his ears are anything to go by. He coughs a little before continuing. “Just try and see if you can beat me. I’m pretty good.”

Okay, yeah. This is something Lance can work with. “Only pretty good?”

A smile creeps up on Keith’s face. It’s kind of beautiful. “It’s been a bad morning for me.”

Lance finds himself having to bite an inevitable smile down. What’s wrong with him? “Well, it’s about to get worse.”

He walks away to the tune of Keith’s light chuckle.

“Bring it on.”

***

Keith wins. He beats Lance’s score by a couple seconds. He wins.

But when he does, he focuses his gaze on Lance, on no one else but Lance, and Lance can’t find it in himself to be angry or sad.

***

“Next time, Mullet.”

“Looking forward to it.”

***

There isn’t a next time.

***

Two weeks later, Takashi Shirogane, as well as two others, set off on the Kerboros mission. It’s only a week before they’re declared dead due to a piloting error.

Another two weeks after the announcement, Keith gets into so many fights that he eventually sets his last foot on Garrison soil.

It isn’t until one year passes that Lance will see him again.

***

He looks through the binoculars.

It’s weird. His heart sings, but it isn’t forceful. He feels a sensation at the pit of his gut, but it doesn’t drag him down like it has all those other times.

He feels like he could fly.

“I’d recognise that mullet anywhere.”

***

They find Shiro. They find Keith. They find the blue lion.

But it doesn’t matter.

“Who are you?”

Maybe love just isn’t for him.

***

Once the initial hurt fades, it leaves a rage in its place. A familiar rage that presents itself in silent glares and petty arguments. Except this time, Keith is an active participant in this rivalry too.

“Worst. Pilot. Ever.”

Lance thinks he’s an asshole.

***

They end up in space. None of it feels real.

They meet an ancient princess and her ancient advisor from an ancient civilisation long gone. They hide it well, but Lance notices the lines of loss that paint Coran’s face, as well as the grief that engulfs princess Allura. An ancient civilisation lost in the span of minutes.

So Lance jokes. He acts goofy and silly to try and lighten the mood, to make everyone focus on something that isn’t pain, even if it’s only for a moment. Because that’s all Lance knows how to do.

Everyone groans. But the air feels lighter now, somewhat.

He wonders when things will start to feel real again.

***

A week in the castle. A week in space.

It’s starting to get to him. To them all.

Maybe that’s why he’s been blowing up at Keith more often. Why Keith mirrors his rage with as much force as Lance.

It’s fucked up, but it’s comforting, in a way. All this fighting. There’s nothing unexpected about it, and they’re both on the same page when they’re like this.

No room for Keith to hurt his feelings, not when he’s already there. Not when Lance is fighting back, too.

***

They throw a party. A diplomatic one. Lance hears Keith laugh for the first time, and it makes the whole universe stop just to hear the sweet melody.

Lance can’t bring it in himself to start a fight. To bicker. He’s weak.

So weak that he tries to make Keith laugh again. Tries an alien drink that smells like it could fuck him up all the ways to Sunday. Dances a little too enthusiastically and a little too off the beat to the music playing. Just lets himself act silly and weird.

It works. It seems that Keith is mirroring his mood too, with his little smiles and grins.

This is where things start to change.

***

Mirror. That’s a good word for it. Mirror.

Because yes, Lance started this journey angry and hurt and frustrated, which fuelled his antagonism against Keith. But it’s not all he feels, not anymore.

He doesn’t feel it when he sees Keith laugh, green food goo in his face and hair and all. Doesn’t feel it when, during the depths of the night, he’ll chance upon the rare view of Keith out of the training deck and watching the stars that now surround them. Doesn’t even think about it when they’re paired up together during a training drill and actually win.

In those rare moments, Lance is content. Hell, he’d go as far to say as he was happy.

Lance notices that, in those rare moments, Keith is too.

Mirror.

Yeah, that’s a good word for it.

***

There’s an explosion. He thinks he hits his head. Everything’s foggy.

But then there’s a hand in his.

He looks up, and a sea of indigo meets his. He’s been attacked, he’s been shot at, and he was in the middle of an explosion. And yet, Keith Kogane brings about a calmness with him that has Lance breathing a little easier.

He smiles. It surprises both Keith and himself.

He squeezes the hand in his.

“We are a good team.”

Despite everything, Keith smiles back. All the hurt and confusion and terror, and Keith smiles back. It has Lance thinking that everything’s okay. No matter what happens, everything will be okay.

He blacks out.

***

When he wakes up, he’s no longer losing blood and reality kicks him in the face.

The reality that his friends are okay. That this war is real. That there is a slight possibility that Lance likes Keith.

This…cannot happen.

“We had a bonding moment. I cradled you in my arms!”

 _I’m sorry, Keith_ , he thinks, _but this never ends well. Not with me_.

“Nope, don’t remember. Didn’t happen.”

It’s better this way.

Love isn’t for him.

***

Their relationship keeps fluctuating, except now Lance knows that this particular dip is his fault. It makes his chest ache. So much so that he avoids Keith as much as he can whilst having to magically pilot a giant robot lion with him.

So, surprisingly easily.

When they’re in the training deck, Lance begs to be paired up with Hunk or Pidge or Shiro, but eventually there’s no dodging his inevitable partnering up with Keith.

It goes terribly.

“You punched my shoulder!” Lance groans. It’s doesn’t hurt, not really, but it’s still a shock to the system.

“You should have read me better.”

“You’re hard to read!”

Keith turns to him, crowds him close, and Lance sees a storm in those eyes. “So are you!”

They both knows what he means.

They pant, never breaking eye contact. He thinks he hears the thud of a helmet against the hard floor, but he can’t be sure.

“Break it up.”

It’s Shiro who says this, but neither boy breaks, not until they forcefully have to. Hunk is pulling him away, and Shiro is pulling Keith away.

It’s a rotten afternoon.

***

“Keith’s alright, you know.”

Lance looks up. Pidge isn’t usually one for starting conversations; she’s a closed book on a good day, especially when it comes to talking about anything that isn’t technical. But her words confuse him.

“What?”

“I know you don’t like each other. I know you hate him. But he’s alright.”

She says all this whilst keeping her eyes solely focused on whatever she’s trying to fix up. Lance scrunches his brow.

“I don’t hate Keith.”

She laughs, a short and harsh huff of air. “Could have fooled me.”

Lance looks down. Plays with his thumbs.

“Look, I don’t know what’s going on between you two, but we’re all going to be stuck up here together for a while. I just think life would be easier if you both called a truce.”

“Didn’t realise we were in the middle of a fight.”

“Really?”

He doesn’t respond.

Just plays with a piece of scrap metal for what feels like hours on end.

***

“What are you doing up?”

Lance turns his head.

It’s Keith.

He looks back through the window. “You made me lose count.”

“Of the stars?” Keith asks, before sitting opposite Lance on the window ledge. “You’ll be here a while.”

“Not the worst way to pass the time.”

“…No, I guess not.”

They both stare into space and let the quiet engulf them. Lance can feel the silence pulse through his ears.

He bites his lip. “I don’t hate you.”

He thinks he sees Keith turn to him from his periphery, but Lance keeps his gaze fixed where it is on the window.

Another moment passes.

“Okay.”

“I don’t.” Lance says. He needs Keith to know this.

“Okay.”

“I’m…I’m sorry if I act like it sometimes.”

Keith finally turns his gaze back towards the window.

“Yeah?”

Lance nods, before realising that Keith isn’t looking at him anymore. “Yeah.”

A pause.

Lance picks at the skin besides his nails.

“I’m sorry, too.”

Lance whips his head towards the other boy. Frowns. “Why are you sorry?”

“I haven’t exactly been making things easy for you. Shiro says I need to stop shouting at you so much.”

Lance chuckles. “That would be nice.”

“Just...just don’t push me away.”

Lance bites the side of his cheek, hard. “I don’t.”

“You do,” Keith says, but it’s gentle. Like all the fight has left him. Maybe it has. “And like, I get it. Keeping things to yourself. But sometimes, when I think we’re becoming friends, you push me away and ignore me for days.”

Lance doesn’t say anything.

“It’s not fair, Lance. It’s not fair on me.”

He knows. Lance knows this. He closes his eyes.

Keith continues. “Because I know…I know what an amazing person you are. And I’d really like to be friends with that person, if they’ll let me.”

Keith Kogane.

The boy who’ll never stop surprising him.

When he opens his eyes, Keith is wearing a small smile, and it makes Lance feel like he has all the power in the galaxy.

“I don’t think I deserve a friend like you,” he says quietly.

“Wouldn’t you like to find out if that’s true?”

He leaves the question hanging in the air, but lets his legs entangle with Keith’s.

He would, indeed.

***

Things are easy. The easiest they’ve ever been in his life.

When he smiles at Keith, he doesn’t feel like hiding it. When his hand grazes Keith’s, he doesn’t feel like shrivelling it away. He feels so incredibly open and vulnerable. He feels great.

Everything is so easy.

Until it’s not.

***

His heart sinks. It sinks into a pit, a deep abys of darkness and terror.

“Keith?”

His voice is so small, so shaky, but he can’t utter a single sentence, not now.

Not after hearing the loud bang of a gun. Not after watching Keith’s body go down.

His vision is blurred, but he runs on instinct. Runs through the orchestral thudding of blazing guns and fire and hell, runs to Keith. It’s like his body knows exactly where he needs to go, exactly where he needs to be.

He makes it. Cradles Keith, strokes his gloved hand down his blood-drenched cheek. He sees his tears fall on Keith’s face. His eyes are barely open.

“You have to stay with me, okay?”

Keith coughs.

Lance tries to hold in a sob as he continues to talk through the tightness in his throat. “Because…’cos you haven’t complained about my bad posture during training in a while. What if I slip up? It’ll be your fault for not shouting at me, and you can’t have that on your conscious, can you?”

Keith coughs again. “L-Lance…”

Another tear drops onto his face. Lance is snotty and pathetic and shaking, holds Keith just that much tighter. “Save your strength, okay? We just need to get you back to the castle, it’s not too far, but you have to save your strength. Just…just stay with me.”

Through the tears and the fear, Lance sees something he never would have expected.

Keith smiles.

“Lance.”

It’s like they’ve lived this before.

A second time.

Lance won’t screw this up, not again.

He leans forward, presses a lasting kiss on Keith’s forehead. When he pulls back, Keith looks at him with a softness that Lance can understand, and it has him sending him a small smile of his own.

He holds his cheek and leans his forehead against Keith’s.

“Everything will be okay.”

He whispers it, and they both believe it.

When he carries Keith back to the castle, he dares the Galra to shoot at them. He fucking dares them to.

***

When Keith gets out of the healing pod, everyone crowds him, until they don’t. Until they part, and the only person left in front of Keith is Lance himself, standing a few metres away.

They look at each other, and they can both feel the energy build between them.

Lance should feel like his heart might explode, like he can’t breathe or think or speak. But he doesn’t. Looking at Keith, he feels easy. Feels calm.

Feels like he could fly.

“We had a bonding moment,” Lance says after a moment of silence. “I cradled you in my arms.”

That breaks Keith out of whatever trance he was under, because his face morphs into a grin. He chuckles, and Lance has never felt so elated to hear a sound in his life.

“Don’t remember, didn’t happen.”

Lance answers with his own grin, until both boys rush into a hug, tight and awkward and right. It doesn’t matter that they’re surrounded by other people, that Lance is finally letting himself have this.

Because this isn’t a diffident love, not anymore. This is something he can live in, something he can breathe.

At the age of twenty one, Lance learns what it’s like to love a boy as beautiful as Keith Kogane.

**Author's Note:**

> If you liked this, please leave a kudos or comment (or both lol). This little nugget of a fic was very fun and cathartic to write ngl, so I hope you guys enjoyed reading!


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